by James Welch
“Shit.” Larue Henderson lit up one of his Salems.
“See, see,” Lame Bull said quickly. “There you go.”
“Shit,” Larue Henderson said.
“See what I mean?” said Lame Bull.
“Oh, it definitely ain’t easy,” said Beany.
“Shit,” said Larue Henderson for the third time.
“You got a foul mouth and you smoke like a woman—you know that, Larue?”
“Shit,” said a woman down the bar.
“Hey, old nightmare, you want a good swift kick in the slats? I got a boot here that’ll tickle your tonsils any time you want.” Lame Bull squeezed my neck for emphasis.
“What I want you sure as hell ain’t got, you old fart.”
Lame Bull laughed and squeezed my neck again. “You want to go in the back room and take an estimate?”
“Boy, you old guys …” She drained her glass. “Buy me a drink.”
Lame Bull bought her a drink.
Larue Henderson hunkered over the bar. I could see the woman beyond the plane of his shoulders. She was around forty. Her lips were dark red and she wore dark makeup around her eyes. Her black hair fell in curls around her shoulders. She was digging for something in her purse.
“How come your boy don’t come down and talk to me?” She didn’t even look up.
“He’s studying to be a priest,” Lame Bull said, holding me down by the neck so I couldn’t get up.
“Tell him I got something here that’ll make him forget them ideas in a goddamn hurry.”
Larue Henderson’s eyebrows lifted above the rims of his dark glasses. “You mean in that purse?” he said.
“If you can’t figure that out, dark eyes, you better go back to your garage and have that boy explain a few things to you.” She got out her lipstick.
“Shit.”
“Do you know her?” I said.
“If it ain’t those goddamn bankers, it’s some smartass woman.”
“She’s on the fight.”
“I’ve seen her around—she’s from Havre, big-city woman—shit.”
“I wonder if she has a car?”
Musty came up to us and asked for a quarter. He was wearing a red-plastic hunter’s cap. Larue Henderson gave him a handful of change and he went away.
“Goddamn Indians … How do you think she knows about that garage? She has a car, all right, if you can call one of them damn Volkswagens a car.”
“Listen, do you remember when I told you I was looking for somebody?”
“I don’t remember.”
“Maybe I didn’t tell you.”
“So what?”
“Well, she’s in Havre.”
“No kidding—in Havre, of all places.”
“Don’t you get it?”
“Get what?” He sighed.
“Put two and two together.”
“Four.”
I laughed.
“Jesus Christ, I must be going insane.” He stood and accidentally knocked his stool over.
“Hey, where you going, dark eyes … you haven’t bought me a drink yet!” The woman giggled.
Larue Henderson walked out the door without turning around.
“He’s a real world-beater, ain’t he?” the woman said.
“He’s troubled by high finances,” I said.
“Aren’t they all …”
I picked up my beer and walked down the bar. When Lame Bull didn’t say anything, I looked back. He wasn’t there.
“What do you think you’re up to?”
“A friendly chat.”
“Well, aren’t you the one.” She held up her empty glass and waggled it.
“Hey, Beany!”
He brought her a shot of whiskey and a glass of water. “A little snake oil for the little lady,” he said.
She swore.
“And another beer for me, if you please.” I pushed a dollar bill across the counter.
“And now what do you want?” she said, sipping the water.
“You mean right now?”
“Oh brother, you young guys are something else …”
She smoked Pall Malls. Several butts were lined neatly in the ashtray, each with the red mark of her lipstick. She shook one out of her pack and put it to her mouth. She wore a diamond ring on her wedding finger. It was very thin underneath, as though it had been worn by somebody every day of several lifetimes. The initials “JR” were tattooed on the flap of skin between her thumb and index finger. The letters were blurred.
“Who’s JR?”
“Well, if that doesn’t—Jesus!” She threw a book of matches on the bar. “Whew … give me a light.”
“Where do you come from?” I struck a match and put it to her cigarette.
“Just where I’m going back to as soon as I finish this drink.” She sipped her water. “I never met anybody so interested in other people’s affairs.”
“I’m just trying to be pleasant. Who’s JR?”
“He might be my husband—he just might be the man who keeps me busy at night. How about that?”
“I don’t know … is he?” It was true that I was interested in her affairs.
“That’s for me to know and you to find out.” She blew a puff of smoke at the ceiling.
“I was just curious—I just thought maybe you’d like to talk about him.”
“Well, I wouldn’t. That was a long time ago, believe me.” She stroked her hair back away from her forehead and continued to smoke.
I leaned back to get a better look at her. I could see only the undersides of her breasts because of her arm, but they must have been large, for they extended far back to a flat belly. Her dress was tight and shiny across her thighs, the dark green reminding me of a mermaid I had seen once.
“I saw that.”
“What?” I coughed into my fist.
She looked sad or disappointed, pretty in her pose.
“I didn’t do anything,” I said.
“I won’t go into it,” she said sadly. She crossed her legs away from me and swung her foot in tight loops.
“I’m sorry—where did you say you were from?”
“Havre.”
“Havre!”
“Havre,” she repeated sadly.
“But that’s where I’m going!”
She lifted the glass of whiskey off the bar and looked into it.
“I have to report for work—foreman on the railroad—tomorrow morning …”
She put the glass to her lips and held it there. “Foreman, my foot—look at yourself.” But she didn’t look.
“First thing in the morning, me and my crew …”
“Trying to tell me he’s a foreman.” She tilted the glass and sipped. The whiskey disappeared in six swallows.
“Well, it isn’t definite.”
“How about another one?”
I signaled to Beany.
“Have you ever ridden on the Empire Builder?” she said.
“The Western Star a couple of times.”
“I rode the Empire Builder to Minneapolis once—looking for work.” She ran her finger around the rim of the glass.
“It doesn’t stop here.”
“‘Oh sure,’ they said, ‘there’s plenty of jobs in Minneapolis … ’” She seemed suddenly bitter, as though the last whiskey had pushed her over a personal edge. “If ninety words a minute isn’t good enough for them, then just to hell with them!”
“Is that what you are—a secretary?”
“Not anymore, buster. That was a long time ago, believe me.”
“Ah, well, that’s how it is.”
“You want to know something else?” She looked directly into my face. “Okay, if you must know, I never worked day one as a secretary.
Trained for two years at Haskell, learning how to squiggle while some big-nuts shot his mouth off, and never even worked the first day!” There were tears in her eyes. She was drunker than I thought. “It’s a lousy world can do that to a girl!”
“It’s not great.” I was getting depressed myself.
“Look at you, bitching …” She turned back to the glass before her. “At least you’re going to work in the morning.”
“It’s not exactly definite.” I felt guilty for having lied to her.
“But at least it’s something.”
“Well, sort of …”
“So you want a ride with me; is that what you’re getting at?”
Beany brought another shot of whiskey and a beer. He refilled her water glass.
“Well, okay,” she said. “If that’s what you want, it can be arranged.”
So it was settled.
“How can you stand to drink that shit?” she said, pointing at my beer. Her voice shook.
20
I couldn’t figure out how I ended up on the couch with a rubber-back rug over me. The rubber was cold against my shoulders and the edge bristled under my chin.
Outside the window, a meadowlark announced the first streaks of the morning sun.
I sat up and threw the rug on the floor. The coffee table was pushed back three or four feet. A glass of diluted whiskey filled with red-tipped cigarette butts balanced on the edge. I set it on the floor. I was in the back part of a room built like a boxcar. An oil stove squatted in a corner opposite me, next to it another couch exactly like mine but with a tangle of sheets and blankets. A pillow lay on the floor. There was a bookcase at the head of the couch but no books—just a few knickknacks, a football and what looked to be a plastic recordplayer. The front part of the room was the kitchen, with a whole assortment of cupboards, dirty dishes and greasy wallpaper. A door opened out beside a yellowed refrigerator—it led to the sun-streaked stucco wall of another house. On the other side of the refrigerator, up against the wall, a kitchen table—and a boy, maybe five or six, quietly eating a bowl of cereal.
I stood and slipped into my shirt, buttoning it quickly, tucking it into my pants, conscious of the boy; but from the sound of the spoon in the bowl he was too busy eating to pay much attention.
The door behind me contrasted with the shabby room—it was new, dark-stained plywood with a glass knob. I turned the knob and peeked into a bedroom: the woman, Malvina (she wouldn’t tell me her last name), lay asleep in a large bed. I stepped inside and closed the door behind me. There wasn’t much in the way of furniture—a dresser, a wooden chair, a small table beside the bed—but the room was coated with lace and ruffles, the window hidden behind a ruffled curtain, even the bedspread was ruffled. It was like being inside a cocoon. Perfume lay heavy on the air, beneath it the faint smell of whiskey.
The dresser was covered with bottles of perfume and cologne, talcs and powder puffs, all delicately colored, all nestled deep in ruffles. Bubble-bath globes lay scattered among the bottles. I picked one up and felt its smoothness. It was light blue, almost transparent. I remembered the cold spring day Mose and I had found the bubble-bath globes in Teresa’s bedroom. My father must have given them to her as a present, perhaps for Christmas or her birthday. They were packed in a clear plastic box with a ribbon around it. Not one had been removed. Now I tried to imagine Teresa in the metal tub on the bedroom floor up to her neck in bubbles. First Raise was not a practical man.
I sat down on the edge of Malvina’s bed. Beside it the table glittered solemnly with gold picture frames. I tilted one toward the window. There was Malvina, younger, prettier, smiling beside a shiny ’53 Buick; another picture showed her in the doorway of a dark cabin, another before a cannon in some public square—all the pictures were of Malvina alone in various places, in various dress, always smiling, although I didn’t think she smiled much. I couldn’t remember her smiling at all last night. I wondered who held the camera—was it JR?—or did she have one that took pictures by itself?
She lay on her side with her back to me. I lifted the sheet away from her body. Her brown shoulder glowed in the shuttered light. I leaned toward her. Her breasts were very large, silky, tipped with enormous brown nipples. My head grew light from the heavy perfume and a sudden rush of hunger for her. I leaned further and stroked the side of her breast. I eased my hand under it and weighed it, rolling the nipple between my fingertips. I started to reach for the dark hair between her thighs—
“Beat it.”
My hand froze.
“Beat it.”
My groin froze.
“Beat it.”
I dropped the sheet over her and sat for a moment, trying to decide how I should attack her, but the thought of the boy eating cereal in the next room took over and I felt the quick desire dying in my crotch.
I went into the bathroom and peed. Then I washed my face with a bar of soap that looked like a cluster of tiny grapes. As I walked through the bedroom I glanced at the bed—she had rolled over on her back, her breasts spread like puddings beneath the sheet. I shut the door gently.
“What do you say, sport?” I said as I walked by the table.
“My name’s not sport,” he hissed after me.
21
Three of us stood separately under the green awning of the Coast-to-Coast store on Highway 2. The other two looked as if they were waiting for the stores to open. I was waiting for Gable’s and The Silver Dollar to open. According to the clock on the bank down the street, we all had twenty minutes to go.
The air was fresh at that hour of morning. The traffic was light, almost nonexistent, although Highway 2 ran east and west through the heart of Havre. The trucks which would be grinding through later had not yet started. Another man joined us, scratching his arm as he studied the brand-new bicycles in the window.
“That three-speed costs eighty-nine dollars,” he said.
I walked across the street and entered the Dutch Shoppe restaurant, where I ordered a glass of milk and a piece of cherry pie à la mode. The waitress’s uniform rustled crisply as she walked down to the milk cooler. Damn that Malvina.
I had just forked in the first piece of pie when a man suddenly plopped down on the stool next to me. He came so quickly, so quietly, I thought he had dropped out of the ceiling.
“Don’t look around,” he said. “Remember me?”
The cherries were sour and I tried to keep my mouth shut as I shook my head.
“You don’t remember me?” He sounded disappointed.
I swallowed the whole lump. “How can I tell if I can’t look around?”
“Oh, I didn’t mean that—of course you can look at me.” He leaned forward. “I mean, hell!”
I looked at him.
“Now do you remember?” he said. “Just don’t look all the way around.”
I looked all the way around. The café was empty. I looked back. He was the man from Malta, the man who had torn up his airplane ticket.
“Hey,” I said. I was happy to see a familiar face.
“Ha—ha—you do remember.”
“Hey.”
“Long time, no see,” he said.
“I didn’t expect to see you again. You were just a tourist.”
“I wouldn’t go so far as to say that; I mean, I’m not your average tourist.”
“No … I didn’t mean to offend you. You’re quite the wanderer,” I said. “How come you don’t want me to look around?”
He dropped his elbows on the counter and rubbed his eyes. The words came from the side of his mouth: “I wish you hadn’t asked me that. I’d hate to see you get mixed up in this mess.”
The waitress tapped her pencil on the counter.
He opened his eyes and with a great air of dignity ordered a cream puff and a cup of coffee.
“In what?” My voice must have ris
en, for he looked around quickly.
“No, really, forget it. I’d never forgive myself.”
“But what are friends for? It’s not as if we weren’t friends.”
“Pass the sugar.” He sprinkled a few grains into his coffee.
“I mean it—what are friends for?”
“Pass the cream.”
“It’s curdled.”
“Oh, God—well, listen here a minute.” He squinted into my eyes. “Are you sure you want to help?”
I nodded.
“Do you understand what’s going on?”
I shook my head.
“Okay, okay, let me fill you in.” He stopped short when an old man in a straw hat and green gabardines walked in.
“We’ve got to get out of here,” he whispered.
“What … that old man?”
“Precisely. You catch on quickly.” As an afterthought, he added: “I like that.”
“You never know …” I said.
“Where can we go?”
“How about the Legion Club? It should be open by now.”
“That’s an excellent idea,” he whispered. “What say we meet over there? No, don’t follow immediately, wait a minute.”
He stood and fished a silver dollar out of his safari pants. “Well,” he said loudly, “I’d better get cracking!”
“No telling …”
“Indeed! For you, honey,” he called to the waitress, throwing the dollar on the counter.
“Good luck,” I said.
“You’re quite kind,” he said, tugging his pants up. “I just might do a little fishing.”
I looked up at him. “But there are no fish in the river.”
He grimaced. Then winked. Then motioned toward the old man. “See you around.”
I finished my pie and coffee, then stood up to leave. The old man was rolling a cigarette. He was shaky and the tobacco kept spilling out the ends.
“He’s not much of a fisherman,” I said. “He deludes himself.”
“Heh, heh,” said the old man. He licked the paper. A bowl of oatmeal sat on the counter in front of him.
“You’re an old-timer. Have you ever known this river to have fish in it?”
“Heh, heh.” He held the cigarette up to admire it. Considering his shakiness, he hadn’t done a bad job. It was just a little bulgy in the middle. “Heh, heh,” he said again. A great crash, as though somebody had dropped a stack of dishes, came from the kitchen. Somebody swore. The old man placed the cigarette between his lips, struck a farmer’s match on his fly, inhaled deeply, then plunged facedown into the oatmeal.